Trust
by peppermintshoes
Summary: Trust between Taichou and Fukutaichou must be earned. It takes time, and indeed some will never earn it


From the LJ community 30kisses, I present to you theme#1: Look Over Here

Title: Trust  
Author: Me!!  
Rating: G. Hoorah worksafeness  
Disclaimer: Clearly not mine  
Summary: Well, its kinda short and one-shotty so you don't get one

**Trust**

"Nanao-Chan, come quickly! You simply _must_ see this."

Ise Nanao momentarily paused her paperwork and scowled as her Taichou burst into the office, his haori hanging off one shoulder and his hat askew. She had been working solidly all day yet instead of the amount of work decreasing, there was now _more_ work to complete than there had been that morning. As much as Nanao didn't mind her Taichou being around, his presence always spelled inevitable disruption to her work.

"See what, Taichou?" she asked, her eyes returning to the paperwork in front of her, wishing she somehow had the ability to make him disappear. She had learned long ago that very few of her Taichou's "discoveries" were even worth noticing, let a lone taking the time to see, such as the new sakura tree he had discovered growing last week, or the new sake dish he had been given by Matsumoto-Fukutaichou the week before, or the stray kitten in the 13th division barracks the week before that. The list of useless discoveries went on and on and despite Nanao's endless protestations that no, she really _didn't _need to see whatever it was he had to show her, she always seemed to be dragged against her will to see it. Whatever _it_ was.

"Why, what I have to show you, of course." He said simply, making his way towards her desk. Before Nanao had a chance to berate her Taichou for stating the glaringly obvious, she felt his large hands attempting to pull her out of her chair.

"Kyouraku-Taichou, kindly desist from your current activity. There's still hours worth of paperwork to finish and its already mid-afternoon, so unless you plan on helping I suggest you go away and leave me to work in peace" Nanao snapped, her frustration over the amount of work that had accumulated throughout the day starting to push through her usually calm demeanour.

"Oh Nanao-Chan, such harsh words." Kyouraku warbled dramatically, clutching his heart as if to demonstrate just how much her "harsh words" wounded him. Nanao rolled her eyes but nonetheless felt slightly less frustrated; although she would never admit it to anyone, she found Shunsui's antics to be rather amusing (if somewhat childish) at times and often found herself fighting the urge to giggle when around him.

Shunsui, as though sensing her slight distraction, took the opportunity to snatch up her inkwell and fling it out the open window, declaring as he did so that "if Nanao-Chan doesn't have any ink, she can't possibly do any work and therefore may as well see what her beloved Taichou has to show her". Nanao blinked at him through her glasses, speechless. Although he frequently stole her brushes in half-hearted attempts to drag her away from her paperwork (she always had several hidden away for such occasions) he had never before gone to such attempts to get her out of the office.

Nanao mentally weighed up the likelihood of Shunsui going away if she were to simply ignore him and continue working as though nothing had happened, and quickly arrived at the conclusion that such a course of action would only result in the loss of more of her possessions. She stood with a sigh, muttering under her breath as she did so. She was never going to finish the paperwork.

- - - - - - - - - - -

Ise Nanao stared through the trees to the barren clearing before her, where two shinigami appeared to be sparring with each other.

"Do you mean to tell me that you dragged me away from my paperwork to show me a _field_" she asked her Taichou incredulously, turning to leave as she did so.

She hesitated when Shunsui made no response, his eyes still trained on the two distant figures in front of him. She followed his eyes and tried to see the figures more clearly. Both were wearing black robes, identifying them as shinigami, and one of them, the smaller one, appeared to be wearing a sleeveless white Taichou's robe over the top. Nanao watched with some interest now as the Taichou lunged, forcing his opponent to raise their zanpakutou in a defensive stance. Nanao idly wondered whether the two figures were training or duelling. She silently cursed her poor eyesight; the only details she could make out from this distance was that the Taichou was small and that his opponent was blonde.

"Do you see what they're doing, Nanao-Chan?" Shunsui asked softly

Nanao shook her head. "I'm sorry Taichou but I can't see much from this distance; I'm very shortsighted, remember?"

To her surprise, Shunsui chucked. "That's not what I meant Nanao-Chan. Can you see who it is from here?"

Again Nanao shook her head.

"That's Hitsugaya-Taichou and his new Fukutaichou, Matsumoto Rangiku. She was assigned to him approximately four months ago. Do you know what they're doing?"

Nanao raised an eyebrow "Given the circumstance, one would assume they were sparring, perhaps using this as an opportunity to gauge each other's abilities." She suggested, watching the deadly dance the two figures were weaving with their weapons.

Shunsui didn't respond and they continued to watch the tenth division officers for several more minutes.

"Do you trust me, Nanao?"

Nanao's eyes snapped from the fight to her Captain at his unexpected question.

"Of course I do, Taichou. We wouldn't make very effective division leaders if we didn't trust each other. You may be terrible at paperwork, and indulge in too much sake, but at the end of the day I know I can trust you, and I'd trust you with my life, as would the rest of our division."

Shunsui smiled. "Exactly, Nanao-Chan."

She shot him a curious look, and he continued, "What you said before, about them sparring to gauge each other's abilities was not wrong, but it was not entirely correct either. Not only are they learning each other's abilities, but they are building _trust_. A division cannot function if its Taichou and Fukutaichou don't trust each other, and that trust must be well-earned, or else it can be broken too easily. You can see by the way they move that they both already know how powerful the other one is, and how the other fights. What you can't see from this distance is that neither of them can see; they're both blindfolded."

Nanao blinked in surprise. "Blindfolded? Why ever would they want to fight blindfolded? Surely its dangerous." She exclaimed.

Shunsui nodded. "Indeed. But think about it Nanao-Chan. If they can learn to gauge each other's movements through reiatsu alone, if they can become so intimate with each other's moves that they know them better than their own, if they can fight each other blindfolded with no fear of harm, then they have learned to trust implicitly. Such a trust between Taichou and Fukutaichou must be earned. It takes much time, and indeed some will never earn it, but in the end that trust is truly a special thing, don't you think Nanao-Chan?"

Nanao said nothing but instead turned her head back to the fight, her Taichou's words reverberating around her head. She thought about all the time she and Shunsui had spend sparring over the many centuries they had been assigned to each other, how intimately they knew each other's fighting styles, As she watched the new Taichou and his Fukutaichou working to build each other's trush, she mulled over her own Taichou's words and decided that yes, the implicit trust earned between a Taichou and Fukutaichou was indeed a special thing.

FIN

A/N: Thankyou for reading XD  
As always, feedback and constructive criticism are very much appreciated. If you liked it, please tell me. If you hated it, well tell me that too, but tell me why so that I know how I can improve :)


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